RICHARD SYLVESTER

(Minnesota & Worcester 1956) (3 April 1933 - 24 November 2020)

Professor Richard Sylvester taught Russian at Colgate from 1978–95. He studied Russian at West Point (along with the mathematics of artillery targeting), English literature as a Rhodes Scholar at Worcester College, Oxford, and Slavic languages and literatures for his Harvard PhD.

After leading his final Russian study groups, Dick retired in 1995 to work on his two volumes of poetic analysis, Tchaikovsky’s Complete Songs (2002) and Rachmaninoff’s Complete Songs (2014), both of which were also translated into Russian.

These two books were published in the Indiana University Press “Russian Music Studies” series. Dick was thrilled when concert organizers asked to use his translations in vocal programs at Carnegie Hall and the Oxford Lieder Festival.

RICHARD SYLVESTER

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